Anger is a healthy, normal emotion when you know how to express it appropriately. Anger management is about learning how to do this. Like Aristotle said, it’s about being angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way. Below you’ll find eight tips to help you take the edge off when you get angry, so that you can deal with your anger appropriately and respond to the situation effectively.
1. Take a time out. If you can, remove yourself from the situation that is making you angry until you can calm down. This can mean going for a walk, taking a bathroom break, or stepping into the next room for a couple of minutes. If you can't leave, try to count up to ten before you respond.
2. Get physical. Physical activity is a great way to release the excess energy generated by anger. Participate in your favorite sport, whether it's tennis, jogging, swimming, going for a bike ride, or taking a Tae Bo class.
3. Talk to someone about the situation. Psychologist Rich Walker of Winston-Salem State University explains that talking to others about a situation which has angered you reduces the emotional intensity of the memory. Walker says that storytelling works best when there is a lot of audience diversity; that is, it helps to tell the story many times to a variety of people.
4. Practice mindfulness. The Buddha would often say: "Nobody is upsetting you. Nothing is upsetting you. You get upset because you are upsettable." We need to understand that anger is a by-product of our way of thinking. By taking control of our mind we can take control of our life.
5. Make sure you're assessing the situation accurately. Sometimes we get angry because we've misinterpreted a situation or someone else's actions. The next time you get angry ask yourself the following questions about your interpretation of the situation:
- What evidence am I relying on?
- What assumptions am I making?
- Is there another equally believable interpretation of what is going on here?
- What is the best action I can take given this situation?
- If my best friend were in this situation, what advice would I give them?
6. Take up meditation. The ability to enter levels of deep relaxation is critical to the reduction of the potentially damaging physical tension and psychological stress caused by anger. Meditation is one of the best ways to induce deep relaxation quickly and effectively.
7. Separate the people from the problem. Instead of telling your spouse "you never take out the trash, you just don't care about our home", you can tell them the following: "when you forget to take out the trash it upsets me because having a clean home is very important to me". This way you’re communicating to the other person that you're upset with something they did, not with who they are. Once you separate the person from the problem you can both team up and attack the problem together, instead of attacking each other.
8. Keep an anger log. Keep a log in which you make a note every time something makes you angry. See if you can start detecting patterns: is there a particular type of situation or a specific person that triggers your anger? Are you more susceptible to getting angry when you're hungry or if you didn't get enough sleep? The aim of keeping an anger log is to identify specific things that make you angry so that you can plan on how to deal with these situations before they happen.
Marelisa Fabrega blogs over at Abundance Blog at Marelisa Online. You can read more about anger management here.